Fraud is a potential risk for merchants and other entities that provide services or interact with consumers. As consumers increasingly interact with merchant systems using portable computing devices (e.g., desktop computers, laptop computer, tablet computer, mobile phones, etc.) over networks, including the internet, the risks to merchants have also increased. Correspondingly, the need for methods and systems of evaluating the risk of consumer interactions with a merchants system has increased. However, it may be difficult for a merchant to discern which interactions legitimate consumers are conducting and which interactions individuals attempting to conduct fraudulent activity are conducting. Thus, being able to determine whether there are risks associated with certain interactions can be important for a merchant.
For example, the merchant may want information to assist in determining whether an interaction should be allowed, such as a change to an email address, change to a shipping address, or a purchase checkout for a transaction. In other scenarios, the merchant may simply want information as to the riskiness of a user browsing items on the merchant's website or attempting to access specific content.
Currently, in order to generate a risk evaluation or assessment for an interaction, data is aggregated from multiple sources and combined to determine a single risk assessment based on the totality of data accessible. A significant drawback of this method is that significant and sometimes unnecessary financial, system, and network resources may be required to gather and aggregate all of the data available. In addition, being able to detect or determine that the current interaction is risky may not be sufficient if fraudulent activity is conducted progressively through multiple interactions. Some interactions may not involve conducting a financial transaction, but may nonetheless, be carried out by a user attempting to conduct fraudulent activity.
Thus, new and enhanced methods of optimizing risk evaluations have become necessary to more efficiently utilize and conserve financial resources and network resources, while providing a dynamic and reliable risk assessment.
Embodiments of the invention address the above problems, and other problems, individually and collectively.